Monday, February 18, 2013

Wow. This might in fact be his creepiest character since "You're my binary messengeer.." On the one hand, he seems like a real evil villain, but on the other hand: do NOT touch one hair in his head!The fangirls are very fond of those hairs. They're not worth killing for, but... (Hmm, or are they?)

At first it looks like he's just sappily admiring art - but no, he's staring longingly at the pretty lady and thinking "That's a nice neck to wrap a bomb around!"

I'm a bit confused, because I thought Dodger was supposed to be some kind of morally ambiguous character, who ends up teaming up with the Green Arrow in the comics. But what will happen here? (Also, I thought he was called "the Dodger" because he's so good at escaping, not because he "doesn't like to get his hands dirty", but OK.)

So, "The Dodger" will be on this wednesday! We'll see what James gets up to.

OH! And in case I haven't remembered to gush about it here, Rekha Sharma, who played Tori on BSG, is also going to be in this episode! I hope they have scenes together, because it would be so much fun to see James and Rekha together again!

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Monday, February 18 2013: Nerd Online Interview!
Sorry for my tardiness with updating this post - last week was crazy.

The Nerd Show interview is there! It's in audio but it's also available on Youtube here. James is interviewed at about 2:30- ca. 8:20. Excellent, a 6-minute interview! It starts a bit comically with James just saying "yes" - is this your first time in Texas, etc. James says he had barbecue and it was delicious. Hmmmm. That's fascinating for me, probably not so much to others. What really amuses me is the bit where he talks about a woman getting an autograph on "her.. bosoms", and how "her boyfriend looked like he wanted to deck me". He wrote, "This is gonna be hard to get off your chest". Heee! He sounds so uncomfortable talking about someone's breasts, he can't even say the word "breasts". Maybe he's not as dirty-minded as you'd think, or is at least so gentlemanly that he wants to be subtle and polite. Awww.

He also says that sci fi fans are very smart, and that if something doesn't measure up to our intellectual expectations, "you hear about it, and you hear about it fast." That's true. I hear a real respect in that statement.

All in all, great interview! Tricia and Eddie are interviewed later on, Eddie's is at the very end and Tricia's at around 30 minutes. (I'm too lazy to hunt the exact spots now.)

Nicole has updated her Livejournal with her con story, parts 1 and 2, which is a fun read as always. The photo of her with James and Tricia (in part 1) is SO CUTE. (Three layers under the coat? Damn, I was hoping he was just getting pudgy.) Also, lots of awesome con photos! James being embarrassed (see below). And just AWWWWW. Awesome.

asked him about his upcoming movie Austenland, which he said was a departure for him, very "silly." He added he's also about to be on "Arrow" in a couple of weeks but sounded... kind of unenthused about that, making jokes about how he didn't really do much in it, "I flew through that show quite LIKE an arrow." He didn't actually sound all that confident he'd be on it again.

..DAMN. This is why I haven't been gushing all week about Arrow. I really think that if he has so little to do in that episode, it's false advertising. It's like "we're gonna have a big sci fi star!!!" and then he's on two seconds. It looked longer than that in the promo, but we'll see.

It had hit me mid-convention that the thing I really wanted to say to Tricia's face more than anything, that somehow I'd never gotten to before, was... basically that whole story about how Gina was gonna be written more sexual and immediately hook up with Baltar* and she was the one who pushed against that and made her more brittle etc.

I won't quote her entire post, so go read in part 2 yourself what Tricia said. This was really beautiful, actually. Too bad Nicole didn't get to ask at the panel.

Here's an up-close version of Tricia telling the story of the infamous "Gaius takes Six from behind" shot. Just look at James' face! He's sooo embarrassed, he closes his eyes. Tricia's husband was on set that day and heeeee. Tricia starts talking about at 2:35.

That's about it, I think. In other news, I switched to my brother's old Macbook Air over the weekend, and if I manage to not break this thing, I think it will improve my blogging greatly. At least it's a lot faster than my old PC was! Also, James uses Mac (or at least he has an iPad), so this is very Jamesworthy indeed.

I haven't even watched the whole thing yet because DONUTS!!!!. The incredibly cute James and Tricia stuff starts at about 17 minutes. She kisses him! Twice!

And then James mentions the donuts. Oh my giddy aunt. It's so adorable, he even makes "donut holding" hands and everything. It's been four years since I found the donut story, and I really didn't think I'd hear with my own ears when he talks about it. I'm beyond joyful.

Meanwhile, mel1lifesashow has posted briefer video, sadly without the aforementioned bits. But it's from closer up, so here you can see James being sheepishly uncomfortable and shy when Tricia talks about the infamous "Baltar takes Six from behind while opera plays" scene. Too cute!!! James talks very highly of Eddie here.
I might provide a transcript, or I might not; since I do it for a living now I have less energy to transcribe James on my free time. I have a feeling I will transcribe the donut bit though. ;)

Coming attractions: The Nerd Show are promising a James interview, and I'll link as soon as it's up. Not sure if it's video or audio, but either way, awesome.

I'm just... wow. I feel like every time there's a con, technology has advanced another notch, and we get full panel videos and photos within days of the con. It's a little hard to grasp. But I'm definitely not complaining. Oh, the donuts of it all.

It opened with the mod asking them about their charity work, so EJO talked about Waterkeeper, Tricia about Acting Outlaws, James didn't really have any project like that but did say he gives money from his con stuff to children's charities. There was a bit of joking from James (yeah, surprisingly not Eddie!) who had misheard something backstage as "charities you'd like to pump for" which he thought was... an interesting use of the word pump. The guy told him he'd actually said PIMP, which is even worse.

LOL! And we thought Eddie was the dirty-minded one!

Oh there was also a little funny line toward the beginning where the moderator said something about Baltar's morality changing with the breeze, and James was all jokingly like "There was no acting required."

James tried his American accent which is still awful. :p He joked about trying to do an American accent in his first scene in Battlestar when they were filming, just sneak it in there with his first line to the reporter, but they wanted him British. He had the best line of the panel when he said it's the dream of British actors to work in America, or rather "for Americans, in Vancouver."

I don't have much to add to that; apparently there weren't too many new aspects (this is where I'm sad Nicole wasn't able to ask, because we had thought of it in beforehand - 17th Precinct since both James and Tricia were there. But oh well.)

Best part of James and Tricia on a panel together, as I said on twitter, was not one but two awkward sex-scene stories, even if I've heard them before. :) They talked about how the mini "glowing spine" scene was the first thing they shot together, and that she was practicing getting the clasp on her overly complicated outfit off. James was eating his anxiety with donuts from catering, and felt awkward about his flesh-colored undies and everything, and he told a crew member he didn't want them to laugh at him and the guy was like "Trust me, no one's looking at you." And he was like "great", and had another donut.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DONUTS.. He.. many donuts, they.. are round for the most part and .. holes i the middle in.. maybe frosting too? They.. I..

I'll comment on this later maybe, if I feel more coherent but I am a very happy little puppy.

EJO talked about the improvised "so say we all!" scene in the mini, but James jumped in and added his perspective which was nice -- he said the rest of them really needed that push, and that something "crystallized" in that moment for the show. He noted that it also felt scary in a way, like a group-consciousness rallying thing.

They should have given Gaius something similar with the cult. There was never chanting, was there?

The moderator went into this whole thing about the late Larry Hagman from "Dallas" (which I guess has a lot of weight given where the con is) enthusing to him about the new Battlestar Galactica and that it had an ensemble of great actors who always had something going on behind their eyes, and the mod was really excited to tell James Callis especially that he had mentioned him and compared Baltar to JR, lol. (I wasn't sure how to take that, since all I've ever heard about JR is that he's eeevil and I had this kneejerk BALTAR IS NOTHING LIKE THIS HATED CHARACTER I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT FROM A SHOW I NEVER WATCHED. But James laughed and seemed pretty tickled about it.)

OH FOR FRAK'S SAKE Baltar is nothing like JR!!! JR was evil. But maybe the positive aspect is that an acting veteran praises your work, so I'm not surprised James was happy. I question Hagman's understanding of Baltar, but may he rest in peace and all that.

Tricia told the other awkward sex scene story about Olmos deciding on the day to do the "taking her from behind" scene in Tigh Me Up (he did ask her in her trailer first, I'm kinda glad to know that), the one time her husband was visiting the set. The cute part is that from the *minute* she started telling this story, when only he (and me 'cause I've heard it before) knew where it was going, James was like burying himself in his chair and under his hat and looking all sheepish and embarrassed. And then afterwards he was like, "I'm SO glad you told that story, Tricia. Phenomenally glad."

Oh also there was a bit where she was like "Are there children here?" and he put his fingers in his ears like "Cover your ears."

Ha! :D He should know if you tell kids that, they want to hear it more than ever.

James praised EJO a lot, said that he would drop everything to work with him again, etc. He did say this one interesting thing about how anyone can act, even in regular life people play different personas all the time, if you're in a snobby store you act like you belong there, etc. But it takes being comfortable, and he felt he could do anything and was "bulletproof" with EJO directing him.

It's always nice to see how much respect they have for EJO. This atmosphere on set is probably also a big reason why the acting is so beautiful. Something of the chemistry comes out on the show.

So that's the main Jamesy bits! Many thanks to Nicole for being my eyes and ears at the con. Maybe one day we'll go together. Not sure if James could withstand such a fangirl attack though.

Other than that, we have two photos: the first photo op picture with all BSG actors and two fans, from yousilvertongueddevil - James looks like a dapper, mild-mannered gentleman! - a cute candid shot from the autograph line from innerfrenchgirl. He looks every bit as lovely and charming as everyone's saying. Awwww. There's also an autograph - "Can't get you out of my head", hee! Nicole got "How taxing", because she works with taxes. Silly cheesy James.

Saturday, February 9 2013: D-d-d-donuts...(Coherent background info: the con's in Dallas, there was one panel with James, Tricia and EJO + photo ops and autographs today and tomorrow. Nicole is currently at the con and will tell us more details later. The donut story has been mentioned before causing immense feels, more details here.)

I don't have a lot of actual updates yet, but Nicole who's lucky enough to be there said James talked about the donuts asjflkjafdkjbkljlafjaljfdljfkaljdflajlaxxxxxxxxxxxx

OMG. Oh god. I am floating. I don't even know.. how.. how do you even expect me to write a coherent post? It doesn't help that I have terrible sugar high from attending my aunt's 60th birthday party. So many pastries (though not donuts).

Besides the donuts which obviously are the main thing about this con and any con they'd ever be mentioned at... Here are the things I've found:

In a particularly adorable move, James and Tricia both tweeted this picture, with the captions "ooh back with my gal xx" and "Ooh, back with my man" respectively. OMG GUYS. They should do ALL cons together, because apparently the world just explodes with cute when they do.

Unlike that picture would lead you to think, he was wearing a BEIGE coat and scarf, not green. As we can see in these panel pictures: flashy smile and a general shot, where we can see the full panel, consisting of James, Tricia and Eddie. I must say the armchairs look comfier than the usual table and chairs. It's almost like they're having afternoon tea at each other's place, chatting comfortably.

A third, clearer picture also shows the moderator. That does take away from the tea party feel. I'd like to see a closeup of James' attire to fully appreciate its qualities. I thought he had huge black pants on both sides of the chair, but they turned out to be heads. (Mind you, I'm not complaining about photo quality or distance; I'm glad we get photos of panels at all.)

Nicole reports that James was wearing a white flannel shirt over a green shirt, with the red cap and sunglasses we can see here. Layers! It's not four, but still three layers with the coat. The coat and scarf look very stylish, so thumbs up, but I realize I miss the black leather jacket. Maybe he retired it after so many cons. I'm not sure about the cap; it's cute and boyish but it hides his luscious hair, so it's both good and bad. And donuts.

Being the flustered uber-klutz I am, I left my program leaflet thing on the floor near James Callis & he yelled my name across the room...

TOO CUTE. Nicole has been to many cons so James knows her, and I'm always really happy for her (and just a little jealous). She's lovely and always rushes to give me details, in mid-con, so she deserves it. :*